With all the hate towards J.K Rowling (deserved) and lets say Kanye West for example, you can enjoy the art but can you really separate what they create from what they say?
Yes, but only in this specific case;
- the artist is dead
- the people profiting from their works don’t have the same beliefs
- the content itself is innocent without the knowledge of the history of the artist
JK Rowling is 0/4 on that FYI
Yep, I wouldn’t be surprised when the old bag dies she donates all her money to something like “LGB without the T” or some other horrid hate group
Yes, you can separate the art from the artist. No, you cannot separate the act of paying for art from the artist while they still live.
This is the big distinction. I think the Harry Potter films are fantastic movies. Not from a critical standpoint, but simply from a “they’re nostalgic and fun to watch, and the music is nice” standpoint.
…Which is why I pirate them. Fuck JKR, she isn’t getting a cent from me.
It depends. JKR or Kayne West? Absolutely fucking not. They are such incredibly shitty people, that you can not separate them. I would not even consume there stuff if its pirated. However, I have plenty of pirated music where the artists are complete shitheads, but I still like their stuff. I Would not give them any money for it or would show it to other people, but if its only for myself and pirated its fine.
However if someone still wants to listen to as example Kayne, please just pirate it. He actively uses his money to do malicious things.
Most of the time I don’t know the artist, and usually don’t care about knowing them. In the rare cases where I do know them is usually because they’re a PoS. And in those cases I make a point of not giving them money, but that doesn’t mean not enjoying their art. For example Harry Potter has a quote that is very pro-trans, during the scene where everyone drank Polyjuice potion to look like Harry there’s this bit of text:
Hermione looked reassured as she answered Kingsley’s smile
Note that Hermione was in Harry’s body at that moment, so she was a woman in the body of a man, and notice how JK Rowling uses a feminine pronoun there. This means that she fully understands that trans women are women, she’s just a PoS that even understanding that devotes time and money to take away their rights.
You can, when you pirate their stuff so they don’t get money.
But then youre invested in it, you might talk and engage with the content fueling it and ultimately making the shitty person behind it richer. I had lot of likeness for certain wizards but I dont even like mentioning them now. Because the author turned out (more like I found) to be very shitty person.
No. Not as long as the artist gets benefits.
This is usually my first litmus test - will the person still benefit? If watching the new HP series will put money into Rowling’s pockets and thus into the hands of anti-trans groups, I’m not streaming it. If you really want to watch something in that category, the high seas await.
But I disagree that you should just find something else to enjoy. If you want to enjoy something, do it guilt free. Our brains don’t get to decide what we find interesting or profound. But if the artist is a piece of shit, just know that singing their praises will drive more people to them.
I would say that giving attention is a similar reward to giving money or power. It’s better not to.
Better for whom? I would say it’s only better for the people being harmed if we aren’t spreading that attention around. But if I listen to early Kanye tracks on a personal device through headphones, is it “worse” because I’m giving him any of my brainspace?
I think OP’s question has two answers, a philosophical one and a practical one. If we cannot practically separate the art from the artist in a way that gives them attention, money, or power, fair enough. I’m just saying I think there is a way to do that.
It really depends. Is the art reflective of what the creator believes? There are so many things from Neil Gaimen I love, but I think he is an utter shit pile. I love Good Omens and Sandman. But the money will still go to him. That is pretty bad. As for Rowling, I do appreciate Harry Potter and how each book grew up with the kids reading it, but I never could stand the insane commercialization of it all before her stupid and insane comments. And the new series, she has specifically stated that she wants to create it to separate her work from the three that have spoken out against her.
I hope it fails miserably. But ig that’s too much to ask for.
Yes and it’s easy
Step 1: Steal the Art. Ensure that the artist does not materially/financially gain in any way from your enjoyment of their work.
Step 2: Talk Shit. Every time someone asks about the art/artist in question is an opportunity to explain in detail exactly why that artist sucks and how to steal their art. Ensure that they do not gain in any other way from your enjoyment of their work. Destroy their reputation so that others do not support them financially.
in my opinion, no. an artist’s worldview informs their art, so things like racism/misogyny/ableism etc etc seep into the works they create. consuming media like that uncritically can be harmful by reinforcing biases, conscious or unconscious.
there’s also the more direct harm that can be done by financially supporting certain artists. jk rowling, for example, is funnelling any wealth she gets from the harry potter franchise into funding anti-trans organisations.
in my experience, people who want to separate art from the artist just want to continue uncritically consuming everything, without feeling guilt over the harm they could be doing by “voting with their dollar”.
an artist’s worldview informs their art, so things like racism/misogyny/ableism etc etc seep into the works they create.
I disagree with this part. People are extremely complex and not even internally consistent with themselves. I don’t think it’s a given that any and all bad qualities they possess are necessarily going to be present in art they create.
I agree that it doesn’t always seep through. That said, I think you need to be extra vigilant when experiencing art produced by someone like Rowling. That bias may appear in unexpected ways and they shouldn’t be given the benefit of the doubt.
This is my stance as well. I don’t want to knowingly consume something that was made by someone who held horrible views for their benefit OR my detriment. With almost unlimited media to consume out there, it seems so trivial to find someone with less problematic views who fills a similar niche. Rowling, Cosby, Chris Brown, etc all have contemporaries who have far less problematic views. And if one of those contemporaries are determined to have some similarly horrible views? We examine what biases may have snuck by us, throw them away, and move on. Humanity has no shortage of creative geniuses if you dig even an inch below the surface.
I think as long as you aren’t monetarily supporting them (pirate that shit) or spreading their name and fame (don’t tell your friends and family who the artist is if they ask) then ya sure go ahead and listen to their music and enjoy it.
I wonder how many people in these comments love an artist that someone else finds objectionable / harmful because they just don’t personally empathize with the people their fav has marginalized.
I absolutely loved Alex Grey’s art for years and years without actually looking into the guy. Turns out he’s a cult leader and he fucked a corpse. Lots of his fans know about it and excuse it just because they listen to Tool
Yes.
Liking this painting does not make you a Nazi.
Let’s suppose the artist had publicly stated their beliefs that certain minority groups should be erased from public life, and was actively using their art profits to fund those goals.
What if someone paid the artist money for it and hung it in their living room and sang its praises to their friends & family after they found out about the artist’s beliefs, goals, and actions?
I’ve seen better from people who don’t kill others. Maybe those artists deserve some of this attention you’re just throwing away here.
Yes, because art is always a competition and my appreciation is a scarce and perishable resource.
Whether or not other artists deserve more attention is kind of beside the point. The point is that people are complicated and multifaceted and both good and bad things can come out of a person. None of us are all one thing.
Clearly JK created something that was loved around the world, but clearly she also doesn’t know how to coexist and empathize beyond her prejudices. The bad thing didn’t erase the good thing from existence, but it certainly complicates our relationship with it.
Well I could say yeah, That is more relatable than “let’s just all celebrate ditty despite what he did outside of being an artist”
Yea we are multifaceted but there are some distinctions that really are not so much a grey area of being on the same complicated human level as everyone else. Are we really boiled down to all capable of being a murderer without also indicating we all have freedom of choice? For some that’s not even entering their mind. So that is understandable to not be relatable and I respect someone’s decision who decides this for themselves . It really is a matter of taste and to each their own. They owe none of these artists anything. No one does. So I think people who are still chewing over this need to accept that.
Rowling, hitler and ditty made some choices. And there is a vast world of artists who made better choices that can take up more than our attention, energy or time we will ever have in one lifetime to celebrate it. And given how many are ignored throughout time over merely being the wrong gender or race in an era why dont they deserve this kind of attention to the point of people arguing?
Time to accept it and move on. Plenty of great artists out there to celebrate. No need to dig through pig shit for a sparkle of gold.
I dunno, I take the approach, to quote Bruce Lee, “Take what works, leave the rest.”
I’m a hopeless idealist in a lot of ways, but I think we cripple ourselves by applying stringent purity tests everywhere in a vain attempt to Never Do Any Wrong Ever.
If you look hard enough, you will find something you dislike or an objectional opinion from any creator of anything, just about. And if you haven’t, it just hasn’t come to light yet. (Hats off to the wholesome BS-avoiding creators out there not being bad to anybody! 💜)
People are, and will always be, imperfect, and while I think we should be aware of authors’ biases or failings when consuming their work, attempting to boycott everything containing an objectional element all the time only serves to make our culture heavily insular and rob oursleves of our own enjoyment in spite of the creator’s personal failings that may have nothing to do with the work in question.
I’m not for supporting someone’s mission in actively being a malicious person, and people should be called out for bad public behavior, but there very much is this twitteriffic phenomenon in recent years where the line gets closer and closer and closer to demanding absolute perfection from people who make stuff, and I think we could all agree there’s a point where it becomes a futile exercise in the ridiculous that only serves to make us more bitter, angry, and cynical.
I would only add to that, if a creator actively uses their money and/or platform for evil, don’t pay for their shit and don’t buzz market them… I don’t care if you want to keep listening to Kanye or whatever, just don’t help them. I take in some problematic content from time to time, but I’ll be damned if I give money to a fascist.
Yeah. Rowling actively pumps her money into lobbyism aimed at hurting trans people. That’s so directly malicious that I wouldn’t want to give her a penny for it.
Separating the art from the artist has never been about avoiding the moral complexities of supporting bigots and fascists (financially or just keeping them in the Zeitgeist). It is that authorial intent is not relevant to personal interpretation (aka death of the author). So yes, you can separate the art from the artist but that’s an entirely different thing from what is being argued here.
If you want to argue as to whether their works should be consumed at all - paid for or not - we should absolutely not be separating the artist from the work. There is little value in them that can’t be found elsewhere and capitalists see the enduring popularity of „that fucking book“ and keeping forking over money for the IP, whether people pirated it or not.
Idk about others, but I can’t. I tried, but I couldn’t love it anymore.
Maybe that’s for the better. I was too obsessed with Harry Potter to move on and read other, better books.
